Wednesday, May 20, 2009

What is "scholarly publishing"?

In the comments to an earlier post, we have been having a conversation about what constitutes "scholarly publishing", especially with respect to publications on web-sites etc. (see the comments to this post). The issues, especially in relation to web-based publication, are clearly very important. I found the following characteristics helpful (from an article by Leah Halliday, 'Scholarly communication, scholarly publication and the status of emerging formats' in Information Research 6. 4 (July 2001); online at: http://informationr.net/ir/6-4/paper111.html).

4 comments
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Many of the problems with E-publication could be sorted out by creating scholarly clearing houses which could allow evaluation of digital (and traditional) publications. These internet databases could offer traditional book reviews, numerically averaged reviews from knowledgeable scholars, and potentially anonymous reviews from a general readership. Likewise, we could track how often something has been downloaded. Think Rotten Tomatoes for scholarly publications.

It's a good idea Christian. I like the idea of "peer review" being opened up to a larger body of readers than current happens with most journals. They would have to have some way to control the "knowledgeable" part of the reviewer though; heaven knows the most popular works are not always the most scholarly.

The durable medium provision brings up an interesting question: which is more durable, print media or digital storage? I don't doubt that we will have digital files created today which will long outlast any dead tree format. On the other hand, digital media is very easy to unmake. Thoughts?